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A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun: The Autobiography of a Career Criminal
A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun is the autobiography of convicted felon Noel Razor' Smith. An extraordinarily vivid account of how a tearaway kid from South London became a career criminal, it is both a searing indictment of a system that determinedly brutalized young offenders and a frank, unsentimental acknowledgement of the thrills of the criminal life. Shocking, fascinating and frightening by turns, it also reveals Razor Smith to be a remarkably talented writer.
496 pages, Paperback
First published June 3, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews
February 12, 2017
ELOQUENT INSIGHTS INTO THE CRIMINAL PSYCHE
By the time he wrote his autobiography, Razor Smith was 42 years old and in prison, where he had spent half his life. He had yo-yo'd between lucrative episodes of violent crime and somewhat longer terms behind bars. It was there that he learned to read and became an award-winning writer. He also became more self-reflective. In consequence, this book offers great insights into the criminal psyche. It's extremely well-written and always an interesting read. You just wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of him...
By the time he wrote his autobiography, Razor Smith was 42 years old and in prison, where he had spent half his life. He had yo-yo'd between lucrative episodes of violent crime and somewhat longer terms behind bars. It was there that he learned to read and became an award-winning writer. He also became more self-reflective. In consequence, this book offers great insights into the criminal psyche. It's extremely well-written and always an interesting read. You just wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of him...
January 22, 2025
Interesting enough life story even if half of it at the time of writing had been spent behind bars
November 28, 2016
A great book on how someone becomes a criminal and what is their mindset about life, cops, friends, woman, family ect. Like most criminals with some regrets about their kids at the end. However, it was fairly entertaining with plenty of excitement, as with most cop or corrections officers stories---you cant make this stuff up----truth ends up being crazier or more entertaining than fiction.
March 28, 2018
Really made me open my eyes to the prison system. The shocking truth of life behind bars from the 70's onwards.
June 4, 2019
a brilliant read packed with wisdom, the opening scene was so gripping and well-written, plus Noel has the perfect balance of reflective content
March 12, 2020
A gritty yet fascinating insight into British prisons and what a life of crime is like
Read
August 21, 2020Hard going. Will try again one day.
January 17, 2024
So interesting but still so tragic a life wasted on crime and violence..his honesty is brutally vivid.
May 24, 2025
My all time favourite book, an excellent and raw telling of how he entered a life of crime and the beginning of journey of rehabilitation.
May 15, 2021
Having left South West London twenty-five years ago I have, like most of us, wondered what the kids I grew up with are doing now. Up until around ‘81’ I would go back to visit every couple of weeks and the conversation would invariably turn to “Who’s in jail?” “Who just got out?” Eventually the question would become “Who’s dead?” “Who’s alive?”
I remember one of my best friends Noel showing me a paper clipping from the South London Press reporting on his failed stick up of an off license in Balham. By 1980 that was the way the wind was blowing. As kids we were always involved in some life-threatening escapade or another, but it was more for kicks and only occasionally criminal. But by the time half my friends were in remand centres or borstals I knew I was well out of it.
So, although it came as a massive surprise, it really shouldn’t have, when I recently discovered that the aforementioned Noel is now better known as Razor Smith and is currently serving life for armed robbery.
Smith has shot, slashed and robbed his way into gangland legend. Before his life sentence he was the frightener in a gang of four known as the ‘Laughing Bank Robbers’ who carried out a string of bank raids around South London, he has fifty-eight criminal convictions to his name and has now chosen to write his autobiography – “A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun.”
Described by G.Q magazine as “One of the most powerful and intelligent crime memoirs we’ve ever read” and “extraordinary” by the Guardian, I just thought it plain surreal to be standing in the middle of Waterstones seeing my name included in the ‘lavishly blood splattered’ memoirs of a major career criminal. Names, places, incidents, half-forgotten friends and enemies and even my brother all contextualised in the pre-teen remembrances of a kid I took my first and only pinch with. (For messing around on a railway track – ironically) And although Smith is no killer and I’m certainly no choirboy – I felt like Pat O’Briens’s priest from the movie ‘Angels With Dirty Faces’ reading about the gangster exploits of his boyhood chum Rocky Sullivan played by James Cagney. In fact, we were all Cagney fanatics in those days, endlessly acting out scenes from White Heat or Public Enemy on the roof tops of Streatham High Road.
The book goes on to outline various ‘tear ups’ between all those old sub-cultures of the late 70’s such as the Rockabilly’s, Skinheads, Punks, Smoothies and Teds which culminated, perhaps, some of the most notorious pre-gun gang wars such as ‘The Battle of Morden,’ ‘The White Swan Massacre,’ and the seemingly fortnightly riots at the Chickaboom Club in Carlshalton. But by the time most of these incidents took place I was lost in music and Razor had gone the way of the gun.
As I say, we all wonder about what happened to the kids we grew up with. I just never thought I’d find out in such a spectacular fashion.
(Island Life Magazine - 2005)
I remember one of my best friends Noel showing me a paper clipping from the South London Press reporting on his failed stick up of an off license in Balham. By 1980 that was the way the wind was blowing. As kids we were always involved in some life-threatening escapade or another, but it was more for kicks and only occasionally criminal. But by the time half my friends were in remand centres or borstals I knew I was well out of it.
So, although it came as a massive surprise, it really shouldn’t have, when I recently discovered that the aforementioned Noel is now better known as Razor Smith and is currently serving life for armed robbery.
Smith has shot, slashed and robbed his way into gangland legend. Before his life sentence he was the frightener in a gang of four known as the ‘Laughing Bank Robbers’ who carried out a string of bank raids around South London, he has fifty-eight criminal convictions to his name and has now chosen to write his autobiography – “A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun.”
Described by G.Q magazine as “One of the most powerful and intelligent crime memoirs we’ve ever read” and “extraordinary” by the Guardian, I just thought it plain surreal to be standing in the middle of Waterstones seeing my name included in the ‘lavishly blood splattered’ memoirs of a major career criminal. Names, places, incidents, half-forgotten friends and enemies and even my brother all contextualised in the pre-teen remembrances of a kid I took my first and only pinch with. (For messing around on a railway track – ironically) And although Smith is no killer and I’m certainly no choirboy – I felt like Pat O’Briens’s priest from the movie ‘Angels With Dirty Faces’ reading about the gangster exploits of his boyhood chum Rocky Sullivan played by James Cagney. In fact, we were all Cagney fanatics in those days, endlessly acting out scenes from White Heat or Public Enemy on the roof tops of Streatham High Road.
The book goes on to outline various ‘tear ups’ between all those old sub-cultures of the late 70’s such as the Rockabilly’s, Skinheads, Punks, Smoothies and Teds which culminated, perhaps, some of the most notorious pre-gun gang wars such as ‘The Battle of Morden,’ ‘The White Swan Massacre,’ and the seemingly fortnightly riots at the Chickaboom Club in Carlshalton. But by the time most of these incidents took place I was lost in music and Razor had gone the way of the gun.
As I say, we all wonder about what happened to the kids we grew up with. I just never thought I’d find out in such a spectacular fashion.
(Island Life Magazine - 2005)
January 19, 2024
Brilliant throughly enjoyed
March 11, 2012
The author, with dozens of criminal convictions and serving a life sentence, details his life of crime. He’s an excellent writer, and has a lot of interesting things to say about the British penal system. Although he did commit a few quite brutal acts, in general he considers himself one of the last of the “noble” kinds of crook: he never mugged a citizen or broke into a house, just fought with gangs and robbed banks. He’s willing to accept a lot of responsibility for what his life became, though he also hangs quite a lot onto a beating he once took as a boy from the police. Since he was far from innocent even then, this seems to be just another case of making excuses. Smith’s certainly a fascinating guy, and has a way with words, so this memoir is very satisfyingly enthralling.
July 1, 2016
I picked up a copy of this book at a second-hand sale and was intrigued by the cover. I love anything set in my native England, and I particularly enjoy autobiographies. Firstly, I was convinced it must have been ghost-written, as surely a character with so few redeeming features as Razor Smith could not write so articulately, especially as he only learned to read and write as an adult? I was wrong, he did pen it himself and the writing is extremely good. I was gripped from the very start and found him to be honest and fair in his re-telling of events. It certainly opened my eyes to the prison system in the UK.
March 1, 2008
Incredible. A true story that seems to mix a few of my very favorite books (Education of a Felon and Borstal Boy) and sets it against the true story of the Clash's "Last Gang in Town". Razor Smith was born a poor Irish kid to FOB parents in London in 1960, and in the 70s formed his own rockabilly gang, the Balham Wildkatz, to fight groups of punks, skins, and mods. Already an armed robber by the time he was fifteen, the author graduated to becoming a serial bank robber. If I was trying to write a fiction book, I couldn't really do better than this.
February 17, 2014
I loved this book. Couldnt put it down. It has this brilliant mix of Cockney slang and London/underworld dialect with well-written English. The stories were funny and poignant and rang true and honest. I was well and truly enchanted! I have already ordered two more of his books and can't wait to dive in.
December 28, 2008
I'm *still* reading this book. I'm still enjoying it. It's a harsh read, but very very good.
Full disclosure - I work for the company that published this book - but it doesn't affect my review. I won't give a good review (or finish, really. Life's too short...) to anything I don't like.
Full disclosure - I work for the company that published this book - but it doesn't affect my review. I won't give a good review (or finish, really. Life's too short...) to anything I don't like.
February 20, 2008
I enjoyed this book. Razor Smith was an old time Robber, who didn't initially use guns. He accepted the time for his crimes and even tried to turn over a new leaf. However, his last time effort cost him more than he bargained for.
September 22, 2007
a bit too many pages on all the crime. the last chapter was great when he finally spoke to his regrets and feelings surrounding the life he led.
December 30, 2009
Too much thuggishness, which the writing, although good, is just not able to sustain.
August 28, 2011
Really enjoyed this book, Razor's a great writer and gives a very honest account of life as a career criminal.
February 6, 2012
Absolutely fascinating especially as I read the second book by Razor first. I could see how he'd got to the point of the second book.
Currently reading
June 13, 2012I love the title.
Read
October 7, 2012awful, gave up on about page 60!
June 7, 2013
'Tis Mighty
February 8, 2015
By far the best true crime book I've read
June 3, 2021
This was really eye-opening. Not my usual read but was bought for me as a present and I couldn't put it down.
January 4, 2016
amazing book! I read it twice, I couldn't put it down
August 13, 2020
Once fearless, reckless youngster, Smith managed to turn his life around, find his way back from the other world.
Unnecessarily long for the content. It took me months to finally finish the book.
Unnecessarily long for the content. It took me months to finally finish the book.
June 11, 2013
As you thought it might be... Admonishment at the end
Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews